Transcription

1 1 Understand how PPC can help you achieve your marketing objectives at every stage of the sales funnel.

2 2 WHO IS THIS GUIDE FOR? This guide is written for marketers who want to get more from their digital marketing by increasing visibility and conversions at the various stages of the sales funnel. WHAT WILL YOU LEARN? Which channels work best at each stage of the sales funnel How PPC can contribute so much more than just conversions Why every digital marketing strategy should include PPC CONTENTS The marketer s challenge What are the options? Search advertising Brand awareness Nurturing Closing Conclusion

3 3 THE MARKETER S CHALLENGE Understanding whether any marketing channel is right for your business requires an understanding of your objectives. Of course, the ultimate business goal of marketing is to make more money, but the nature of every industry, market and individual company means that the route to that goal has to be achieved in different ways. If you sell everyday products via an ecommerce website, marketing becomes a lot simpler tell potential customers you exist and you ve got a fighting chance of a sale. However, if your products/services are a more complicated proposition, then choosing your marketing tools is a bigger challenge. To understand this better, let s begin by returning to marketing 101: the sales and marketing funnel. AWARENESS Most marketers have seen it and if they haven t, it s likely that they are using the basic principles of it already. The funnel illustrates the journey of a new customer from first to last interaction before making a purchase or equivalent. For some businesses, this process can happen the first time a user engages with them. For others it can take months or even years. The clever marketer knows that they need to take a holistic approach to advertising. This means not only going after the low-hanging fruit but also generating new awareness, building relationships and nurturing potential customers through the funnel. INTEREST CONSIDERATION INTENT EVALUATION This is particularly important for businesses that need to educate potential customers about the benefits of their particular, often niche, product or service. Once they ve generated that awareness, they then need to maintain it, often through long buying cycles. In an ideal world, marketers would have an unlimited tool box to promote messages that are relevant to each segment of the process. Inevitably, the marketing budget will always have the final say on what advertising channels they pick. Let s scrutinise PPC as an advertising channel and understand how it can influence the various stages of the funnel. SALE

4 4 WHAT ARE THE OPTIONS? Broadly speaking, established PPC channels include the following formats: - Search - Display (banners) - Shopping - Social Any of these can arguably be used to affect elements of the funnel, although some are more suited to particular parts than others. Here s a typical breakdown of how that might look in practice: - Remarketing - Video Display Advertising Social Promoted Posts Video Advertising AWARENESS INTEREST Remarketing CONSIDERATION INTENT EVALUATION Shopping Campaigns Search Advertising Social Adverts SALE When implemented strategically, with consistency of brand and messaging, these channels can form a completely joinedup campaign, allowing you to encourage users through the entire journey. Other than the part of the funnel you re attempting to influence, there are several considerations that might affect what channels you choose: 1) Budget 2) Audience relevancy 3) Compliance or censorship issues 4) Website functionality 5) Current website traffic Some of these factors can be adjusted with relative ease, such as your social profile; others require additional resources like adjustments to website functionality. Some are out of your control altogether, such as industry compliance issues. However these factors affect your business or product will form a fundamental part of your decision making process. It s worth noting that, while we are using PPC as a general term for online advertising, most of these channels do offer the option of other pricing models based on specific metrics such as impressions. Now that we ve established what types of channel are available and some of the considerations necessary for them to be viable, let s explore them in more detail. 6) Social profile status

5 5 SEARCH ADVERTISING Before we take a look at what works best where, let s begin with search. It offers a unique opportunity versus other channels and can influence any element of the buying cycle. The age old challenge of marketing is getting in front of the right people at the right time; the individuals who want what you offer the people you have solutions for. With this in mind, users of search engines are therefore the perfect audience. They are literally telling us exactly what they want and we have the chance to be in front of them at that key time. Understanding a user s intention allows us to know where in the funnel they are. We often have the opportunity to identify their intention based on the nuances of language used in their search queries. A user at the top of the funnel might be using research terms such as how, what is, advantages of etc. A user closer to the end of the funnel, meanwhile, will be using terms such as buy or specific product details likes brand names, model numbers or other specific attributes. This makes search advertising an ideal solution for content promotion as well as direct response campaigns. How search advertising supports your SEO In 2011 and 2012 Google ran two large scale experiments known as the Search Ads Pause studies, which showed that having a search ad is important even when you have great organic visibility. The study showed that even with an SEO result in position one, 66 per cent of ad clicks are incremental, meaning if you removed the ad, they wouldn t be recovered by the organic result. This means that even if you have a top organic position for a keyword, a search ad can provide a lot of additional traffic. Organic search vs paid One of the first questions advertisers ask themselves before doing search PPC is whether or not they are getting good traffic from search without paying for it (organic). Recent changes to Google s SERPs now sees up to four ads at the top of the page above the organic listings. Notice in the image opposite, that we only see one organic link above the fold for this particular search. is less vital but should always be kept in mind to fend off new competitors that enter the market. Depending on how many competitors operate within your market, there s almost always a chance that you re missing at least some traffic to ads sitting above the organic listings. There are some instances where businesses operate in such niche markets that they have very little opposition in SERPs from paid or organic sources. In these situations, search PPC We only see one organic link above the fold for this particular search.

6 6 Budget You ll hear many PPC experts say: If you put 1 in and get 2 back then budget is not an issue, which is true of any advertising campaign particularly PPC where ROI is so easy to define. Note, however, that search campaigns often take time to refine and understand where to focus your budget to achieve that return. Depending on the volume of traffic moving through your ads, this can take anything from a few months to a few years. An idea to try A great way to reach new customers, especially in highly niche industries, is to target people who are searching for your competitors on Google. Bidding on competitor brand and product names is entirely legitimate, though you cannot use their brand names in your ads. Competitor brand name keywords tend to require a much lower bid than generic keywords. If you re promoting a service, then bid on keywords which suggest the user is unhappy with your competitor s service, for example {competitor} complaints.

7 7 BRAND AWARENESS Brand campaigns don t often have a tangible outcome in the short term, so are typically ignored by many small to medium-sized businesses. These companies frequently opt to focus on easy wins that point to ROI. However, without brand awareness campaigns, the sales funnel inevitably becomes narrower. Videos YouTube is the world s second largest search engine. Niche products and services, particularly those new to market, often need a degree of education for potential customers. Video can be a fantastic way to help audiences understand concepts quickly in an engaging format, rather than large technical documents or web pages. Another huge benefit of YouTube advertising is that it s typically very cheap compared with other channels. This allows you to push your brand message far and wide for a lower cost. Certain adverts on YouTube only charge you if the user has watched 30 seconds or more, allowing you to push your message even further, guaranteeing that you only pay if your message has been seen. How social advertising supports your content marketing Social advertising should be an integral part of every content marketing strategy. Sharing and boosting your content on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn allows you to target your content to users based on their interests. If users share your promoted content on Facebook, additional clicks from those shared posts are free of charge! Display The Display networks allow you to really target your message to the right individual as you can target via demographic, topic and even placement. If your target market is women between 25 and 40 with young children, you can choose this demographic. Then, you re able to control your placements and negative out any that you feel don t quite fit, i.e. you would probably keep in placements like Ebay or Mumsnet, but remove websites that reference teenagers. Due to the large number of sites on the display networks, you can build up a large number of impressions at a low cost. Although your click through rates are likely to be lower than on the search network, this doesn t mean that people are not recognising your brand. As you are engaging people when they are potentially not looking for your product or service, this is a branding exercise and one that again allows you to get your message out very cheaply.

8 8 Social Advertising Social promotion can allow you to be as broad or as targeted in your approach as you wish. Using Facebook, you can target by demographic and also by topic or interest. For example, if you were Amazon, you might target people who like John Lewis, as both have similar target audiences. With Twitter you can target via keywords or hashtags and even at times when specific TV shows are on. If your brand was being represented on a programme, you could look at capturing the multiscreen audience and stream adverts during those slots. Like the display network, Facebook and Twitter allow you to get your message out at generally a lower per-click cost than other channels. You must remember, though, you are showing your message at times when people may not be actively looking for it, so click through rates can be lower. However, with the right message, you can be highly successful using these channels. An idea to try Run a competition and promote it through social advertising. Competitions are a great way to generate excitement about your products and services and encourage people to engage with your brand. When running a social ad for a competition, urge people to share the promoted post, as additional clicks from shared posts are free of charge..

9 9 NURTURING If you have a longer sales cycle, or some customers just need more time to complete a purchase or information request, there are various methods to allow you to nurture this. Remarketing You can build remarketing audiences in both Adwords and Google Analytics, though the latter allows you to be a lot more specific with your targeting. With GA you can specify all sorts of requirements, from source to time on site and bounce rate. You can show different creatives to different people, depending on the actions they took on the site. If someone only visits the homepage, you might just want to show them a brand message, whereas if they visit the homepage and a category page, you could show them a message from that category, as that s where their interest may lie. You could also use Dynamic Remarketing Adverts which can show specific products to the individual once they have left your site. Another good way to use remarketing, if you re a lead generation website, is to use different messages depending upon criteria. For the first week after a user visit, you show them an advert that links to your About us page. If they engage with that advert, you can then show them another that links to case studies. This gives them more information and hopefully pushes them down the sales funnel. Customer Match This is a relatively new feature in Adwords which exists on Facebook as well. It allows you to target people based on their address. This is really useful if you do have a multistage sale, such as offering free samples and attracting samplers back to your website. You could target the list of sample addresses, perhaps even directing them back to a page which offers a discount for people who ordered a sample. This will help you guide these individuals down the funnel and will hopefully stop them shopping around if your product is not unique. How Customer Match supports your marketing Customer Match targeting can run alongside your marketing campaigns, targeting the same addresses and promoting the same messaging.

10 10 An idea to try Customer Match audiences can also be used to exclude those people from your target audience. If you don t want to show certain ads to existing customers, exclude a Customer Match audience. You can also exclude users who have recently purchased or logged in to your website using traditional remarketing audiences.

11 11 CLOSING One of the best ways to search for customers who are ready to close a sale is through the search adverts, as discussed earlier in the article. This is where you can put the targeting methods in other channels to good use. Due to the lower cost per click and impression, they can also serve as effective tools for converting customers. If you were looking at how to convert customers, you might want to look at how to manipulate word of mouth, to help generate leads. To do this, you could target friends of people who like your service. Virgin Media regularly does this on Facebook as their social team knows that friends are likely to have seen the service or even interacted with it. They know that people who like the Virgin Media social page tend to be customers so may have said good things about the service meaning the friends should be easier to convert. It also says at the top of the advert which friends like the service. As highlighted in the nurturing section, this is where you can start closing customers using remarketing and Customer Match. If you have a multistage cycle, this is the point at which you could change your message to get those customers to convert. This could be through an offer or discount that would be relevant to that customer base. Using tools such as countdown adverts to create a sense of urgency around the offer may increase the need for customers to act fast. Shopping campaigns This type of campaign is available on Google Adwords, Bing and also via a shopping feed in Facebook. Here, the system uses an algorithm to look through a list of products you provide to show relevant results. Therefore, if someone searches for red fence, it would try and match the search query to products in your feed. This is not always as accurate as you would like it to be, though, so ensure you manage your feed correctly to ensure you get the best results. Opposite is an example of how the shopping campaigns appear on Google. As the query is so broad, Google does not know if the user wants a fence panel or paint, so it offers both as an option. Shopping adverts can be very powerful and, when done well with the correct segmentation, can produce fantastic results. They show up for searches where people have a buying intent and are positioned right at the top of the screen, to encourage customers to convert.

12 12 Customer retention Depending on the product or service you sell, this part will vary greatly. When you have converted a customer, try turning them into a brand ambassador by prompting them to like your social media profiles. Facebook is especially effective, allowing you to create an audience and target them exclusively for a likes campaign. You can then attract their Facebook friends, extending brand awareness. Additionally, you could ask ambassadors to leave a Facebook review, so that it s seen by friends and family. An idea to try A great way to make your customers feel appreciated is to use remarketing on display and social networks to thank them for their recent purchase and offer them a discount on their next purchase. Don t use this technique for products which are likely to be purchased as gifts though, or you might end up spoiling the surprise!

13 13 CONCLUSION Whilst not all suggestions are correct for every brand, if you review what you are currently doing and look at what stage of the funnel this is affecting you ll see what other opportunities are there for your brand or company. One of the best things about paid search is how you can track return on investment and how you can trial different channels to work out exactly what is working for you. NEXT STEPS New to PPC? A good first step would be to draw up a list of keywords that you want to rank for. Use the keyword tool to assess your budget requirements and what results you might expect when considering your budget and click cost. This will allow you to assess how it will work for your business and if you need to either scale up or scale down your ideas. One thing to remember is: don t try and do it all at the same time. Start with a search campaign and then expand into the other areas as your return on investment grows. Existing PPC campaigns not performing? If you re already running PPC campaigns but they aren t performing as well as you d like, get an audit done. Our team of experts will review every aspect of your campaign, identify areas where we can save you money and then expand the campaign to get a better return on investment. If you need any help with either of the above, call our PPC specialists on: or

SOCIAL MEDIA ADVERTISING STRATEGIES THAT WORK ABSTRACT» Social media advertising is a new and fast growing part of digital advertising. In this White Paper I'll present social media advertising trends,

PPC Case Study THE PPC STORY Hidepark is a leather garment manufacturer based in Grantham, Lincolnshire. Before coming to Fifteen, they already had an established client base and a successful Google Adwords

ARE YOU SPENDING YOUR PPC BUDGET WISELY? BEST PRACTICES AND CREATIVE TIPS FOR PPC BUDGET MANAGEMENT In pay-per-click marketing, as with so many things in life, you have to spend money to make money. But

PPC - Pay Per Click What it is and how to build a successful campaign A Publication of Digital Marketing Experts theeword Introduction This guide provides a brief introduction to PPC, helping businesses

7 Tips to Boost Buyers Using Google Adwords & Analytics Andrew R Edwards info@andrewredwards.com About Me 9 Years Full Time Internet Marketing Google's advertising system in which advertisers bid on certain

A SIMPLE GUIDE TO PAID SEARCH (PPC) A jargon-busting introduction to how paid search can help you to achieve your business goals ebook 1 Contents 1 // What is paid search? 03 2 // Business goals 05 3 //

The Ultimate Facebook Marketing Guide How to get more leads with Facebook Marketing 1 info@marketing.com The Ultimate Facebook Marketing Guide. How to profit from Facebook Ads and Achieve Greatness. In

New Solutions New Opportunities What is Penton Marketing Services Penton Marketing Services offers a full range of content solutions, digital services and lead nurturing and qualifying services that leverage

Web News Apps Videos Images More Search Tools How to Use Google AdWords A Beginner s Guide to PPC Advertising How to Use Google AdWords offers.hubspot.com/google-adwords-ppc Learn how to use Google AdWords

DIGITAL MARKETING SERVICES We take a custom approach to digital marketing. Unlike high-volume agencies we recognize that every client (and every project) is different. Rather than attempt to fit your project

Tapping into Mobile App Installs Building a Valuable User Base for Your App Introduction If your business has an app, or you re planning to launch one, you ve probably spent a lot of time thinking about

DIGITAL MARKETING SERVICES We take a custom approach to digital marketing. Unlike high-volume agencies we recognize that every client (and every project) is different. Rather than attempt to fit your project

1 INBOUND MARKETING Digitally marketing a product or service can get complicated. Before digital came along things seemed easier. Consider a farmer s market: a farmer has a product and displays it on a

Google AdWords vs Google Analytics: Dissecting Remarketing Lists Written by Carrie Albright, Senior Account Manager In PPC, the power of remarketing is undeniable. Being able to interact with those who

OVERVIEW OF INTERNET MARKETING Introduction to the various ways in which you can market your business online 2 April 2012 Version 1.0 Contents Contents 2 Introduction 4 Skill Level 4 Terminology 4 What

Don t Leave Your Money on the Table WSI White Paper Prepared by: Ron Adelman Search Marketing Expert, WSI Introduction When was the last time that you looked online for a product or service? What stood

214 INTERACTIVE CONTACT DREW PICKARD 214-991-1298 DIRECT DREW@214INTERACTIVE.COM INCREASE YOUR VISIBILITY. IMPROVE YOUR REPUTATION. LET US HELP YOU SHOW UP AND SHOW OFF. 214 INTERACTIVE IS A FULL SERVICE

Generate Leads With -YouTube- Creating YouTube Ads How does a company launch a simple video on YouTube and within a couple of hours make a sale for $7,500? How does another company gain millions of views

The 4-Part Guide on Getting New Clients with Video Marketing By: Ben Marvazi Founder, Promoshin.com This guide will go through the 4 steps you need to follow to create a video, use that video to attract

What is Prospect Analytics? Everything you need to know about this new sphere of sales and marketing technology and how it can improve your business Table of Contents Executive Summary... 2 The Power of

Remarketing and Retargeting By Ann Stanley Managing Director of Anicca Digital Remarketing aka Stalking What is Remarketing and Retargeting? Remarketing/retargeting are online advertising techniques where

The Power of Online Directories and How to Get Started Fast! Introduction More and more small businesses today are using online directories to their benefit. If you run a small business then odds are you

How to get 2 Cents Clicks by Colin Klinkert Hi, Colin Klinkert here at CKTV, that you can find at http://www.colinklinkert.com. This video is a very exciting one where we re going to talk about how you

Why It s Essential for Home Improvement Companies to Use Digital Marketing A Quick and Easy Guide to Digital Advertising for Local Businesses TABLE OF CONTENTS 3 5 8 The State of Home Improvement Marketing

The 4 Step Guideline To Online Marketing Success Intermediate Understanding and Winning with Online Marketing is as Simple as Understanding the Following Four Areas Attract traffic to your website Convert

Why digital marketing? Online marketing isn t a fad, and it s not new. If your business doesn t have an online presence, you are already behind your competitors and missing out on literally millions of

[Type text] Paid Search: What Marketers Should Focus on in 2014 NETBOOSTER.COM Sergio Borzillo, Head of PPC (UK) Paid Search: What Marketers The 4 main areas to focus on for your Paid Search strategy in

Top Of The Search Helping Companies Expose Their Brand On-Line www.topofthesearch.co.uk tweet us: @topofthesearch or email us: sales@topofthesearch.co.uk Top Of The Search Top Of The Search is a Digital

COMMERCIAL INTENT HOW TO FIND YOUR MOST VALUABLE KEYWORDS COMMERCIAL INTENT HOW TO FIND YOUR MOST VALUABLE KEYWORDS High commercial intent keywords are like invitations from prospective customers. They

7 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW BEFORE TRYING GOOGLE ADWORDS Discover how Google AdWords works and learn how to plan before investing in pay per click marketing to give your business the best chance of success.

Don t Leak Leads Insert Copy Here Insert Copy Here How To Identify Leaks & Get More Customers 1 Our Mantra: Don t Leak Leads In the perfect world, getting every prospect to become a customer would be a

DEVELOPING A SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGY Creating a social media strategy for your business 2 April 2012 Version 1.0 Contents Contents 2 Introduction 3 Skill Level 3 Video Tutorials 3 Getting Started with Social

Marketing Online SEO Facebook Google Twitter YouTube What is Internet Marketing? Internet marketing is considered to be broad in scope[1] because it not only refers to marketing on the Internet, but also

HOW TO MAKE PAID SEARCH PAY OFF PAY PER CLICK MARKETING STRATEGY Paid search marketing is one of the most effective marketing tools ever developed because of how targeted and flexible it can be. Google,

White paper Choices in Marketing The term marketing automation is deceptive it suggests a clean, intuitive and straightforward way of generating, monitoring and cultivating your customer base. In reality

Paid Advertising on Search Engines: Tips on how to create and manage a successful pay-per-click marketing campaign What are the Benefits of Pay-per-click Advertising? The goal of any website is to attract

Impressive Analytics and Insight on a Shoestring Lisa Ikariyama & Tracy Anderson Cabbage Tree Creative www.cabbagetree.co.nz Getting Started Before you design a page on your website or get started with

Advertising online Advertising on the Internet can be an important part of an online marketing strategy, helping to drive traffic to a website. Research shows that online advertising works well with other

www.zodeo.com Learn Why Your Small Business Should Advertise on YouTube AdWords for video Advertise your business on YouTube and across the web What ll we cover! What is AdWords for video?! Why use AdWords

Lead Generation in Emerging Markets White paper Summary I II III IV V VI VII Which are the emerging markets? Why emerging markets? How does the online help? Seasonality Do we know when to profit on what

What is PPC? PPC stands for Pay-Per-Click. When you market your website with a Pay-Per-Click campaign, your website is prominently displayed on the search engine results pages to customers who are looking

The 20-Minute PPC Work Week Making the Most of Your PPC Account in Minimal Time A WordStream Guide The 20-Minute PPC Work Week WordStream Customer Success Making the Most of Your PPC Account in Minimal

THE SME S GUIDE TO COST-EFFECTIVE WEBSITE MARKETING Learn how to set your website up to convert visitors into sales and drive traffic to your website using online advertising. A publication by: Introduction

Shallow Review of Online Advertising There are four main types of online advertising: 1. Search Engine Marketing: Techniques that increase a sites visibility in search engine results. 2. Social Media Marketing:

THE 20-MINUTE PPC WORK WEEK MAKING THE MOST OF YOUR PPC ACCOUNT IN MINIMAL TIME THE 20-MINUTE PPC WORK WEEK MAKING THE MOST OF YOUR PPC ACCOUNT IN MINIMAL TIME If you look at the pay-per-click (PPC) marketing

8 Simple Things You Might Be Overlooking In Your AdWords Account A WordStream Guide 8 Simple Things You Might Be Overlooking In Your AdWords Account AdWords makes it incredibly easy to set up and run a

DIGITAL MARKETING BASICS: PPC Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is an umbrella term referring to all activities that generate visibility in search engine result pages (SERPs) through the use of paid placement,

Google AdWords Remarketing AdWords remarketing is not only great for driving visitors back to your website to convert but is also great at improving your branding which in effect increases conversion and

Hi, Are you trying to understand the complexities of MARKETING on the Internet? At UpFrontbyDesign.com we re here to help you better understand these complexities, eliminate the fear of wasting money by

MY DIGITAL PLAN BROCHURE Digital Marketing Overview What is marketing? What is digital marketing and why is it required? Traditional marketing v/s Digital marketing How to do it? Visibility of my brand